Disclaimer: Doctor Who is not mine. It's very sad.
Warnings: PG-13

Epilogue: Time to Wake... Everyone wakes up sometime, whether you dream or not.

Epilogue: Time to Wake

Rose woke to the quiet sound of the TARDIS humming, which sounded pleased as soon as the ship realized she was awake. It took a moment to think of where she was, to realize she was held by the sleeping Doctor, with the sleeping Martha sitting on a chair nearby. She wanted to touch her stomach, but didn't dare move for fear of waking either of them, so instead she closed her eyes, wondering if she could move backward to be with her mother again.

Dimly, she thought she could see a blue gravel path behind her – or at least, sense that it was there, sitting just a few minutes behind, but already the path was hazy and falling further out of focus. Rose almost considering racing back after it, but there was a rustling sound, and she opened her eyes again.

Martha was awake and leaning over her. She broke into a grin as Rose opened her eyes. "Hello," Martha whispered, barely making any sort of sound.

"Hello," replied Rose, and the Doctor shifted in his sleep.

Martha quickly felt for Rose's blood pressure, and counted under her breath, before smiling at her patient. "Welcome back."

"What happened?"

"Oh, the Doctor saved the day, as usual. I helped. Julio's sitting on Elizabeth's court now – I looked him up on the TARDIS computer, he ends up with an estate in Cornwall and marries one of her ladies-in-waiting. What do you think of that?"

Rose smiled. "Thought I had a chance with him."

"He named his first daughter Rose, if that helps. Expect you're hungry," said Martha. "Tea and soup?"

"A sandwich?" asked Rose hopefully. "Prawn mayo? And chips?"

"If it's there," conceded Martha. She stood up to go – then impulsively bent over again and kissed Rose on the forehead. "I really am glad you're awake, Rose."

Rose watched Martha hurry out of the room. All right, perhaps Martha did like her, as the Doctor insisted. Martha seemed to think she was all right, and not terribly near death – so perhaps she wasn't going to die, after all. Rose slipped her hand down to her stomach, where she could feel the fluttering anew. Without a doubt, Rose knew the baby was there, in a way she hadn't quite realized before. It was real, all of it, the baby and the man laying next to her on the bed. Rose suddenly realized why the Doctor was so anxious to wrap her in cotton wool – the idea that either of them could be taken from her made Rose nearly lose her breath.

In just a year, she'd be a mother. She had the proof fluttering below her fingertips, so gentle, those same fingers couldn't even feel it. But it was there all the same, just for her.

Rose turned her head to the Doctor, about to whisper him awake as she couldn't wait another moment to speak to him, and found the Doctor already looking back at her with eyes open.

"Hello," he said softly.

"I felt the baby move," she whispered back, and his eyes widened. His hand quickly covered hers on her stomach, but after that he went completely still.

"I can't feel it."

"I can hardly feel it – just like a flutter."

"But it woke you up—"

"No," said Rose. "I woke me up. I wanted to wake up. Mum said I should—"

"Jackie?" The Doctor pushed himself up. "How long have I been asleep, that you rung your mother already?"

Rose laughed. "No – I saw her. I was with her, in Pete's garden, and that's when I felt the baby move."

The Doctor frowned. "How did you get to Pete's garden?"

"I walked. I think I walked – I remember walking. There was a path, and it split off in two, and I went on one side, and there was Mum. But it wasn't right – I was supposed to go down the other path, so I left her and came back to you."

The Doctor picked up her hand then, and kissed it. "You must have been dreaming."

"She knows – my mum, I mean, she knows that time is moving faster for her. She said it was okay. And I told her about the baby."

"Rose," began the Doctor again, but Rose cut him off.

"I wasn't dreaming, Doctor. I was sitting there. I saw Molly racing down the garden. There's a pond that Donald made for a school project. I walked to my mother, Doctor – and then I walked home to you."

He kissed her hand again. "To me?"

"Well, it was hardly to Martha."

"You chose me."

Rose shook her head. "Bloody daft Doctor."

He settled down again, resting his chin against her shoulder, and she let her eyes close. Perhaps it was the baby – perhaps it was the part where she nearly died, but she was still exhausted. And hungry. Martha wasn't being half slow with the sandwiches.

"Doctor," she murmured. "You ask Mum, if you don't believe me. She'll tell you."

"I believe you," replied the Doctor as he nuzzled her. "Go back to sleep."

"You know that I trust you, don't you?"

"I know."

"I'm not afraid of forever anymore."

"Course not," said the Doctor. "You've got me and baby to share it with, and your mum is just on the other path."

"I don't know if I can find the path again, though," said Rose with a yawn, thinking that she might doze until Martha returned with sandwiches.

"Nothing to it – we'll look behind every bush on every planet," said the Doctor. "What did it look like?"

"Just a path in the middle of nothingness. Nothing ahead, nothing behind. And then it split, off one way and off another," said Rose, closing her eyes.

The Doctor stilled. "Like a fork in the road?"

"Like the poem," agreed Rose. "All laid out in bright blue gravel."

Rose fell asleep, but the Doctor remained awake, his mouth slack against her shoulder.

Like a fork in the road...all laid out in bright blue gravel.

A fork in the road…a crossroads.

The Doctor wrapped his arms around Rose, and pulled her just a bit closer. She sighed and turned her face toward him, waking only enough to murmur something unintelligible. He kissed her forehead absently, and began to think. Twenty minutes later, he was still hard at thinking, and never heard Martha return with the tea.

The Doctor and Rose

will return

in Part Four of the Crossroads series:

A Blue Gravel Path